Setting the Digital Transformation Agenda

The emergence of digital and mobile technologies has radically changed the way enterprises do business. Whether it’s a global manufacturing company, a startup or a local retail chain, the digital revolution is transforming every business into a technology company. The impact of this big shift is clearly felt on an enterprise’s employees and customers.

Employees now expect more than just desktop communications. They want a seamless communications experience that fits into how they work instead of changing how they work – helping them stay in touch on their device of choice as they move throughout their day

Similarly, the expectations of customers too have fundamentally changed. Customers today expect to engage with vendors and retail brands seamlessly across a variety of touch-points, including social media, mobile applications, websites, traditional telephone, and face-to-face, on their terms.

Against this backdrop, ETCIO, in partnership with Avaya, recently organized a two-city roundtable conference for top enterprise technology leaders.

Themed ‘Bringing Your Digital Transformation Strategy to Life’, the event was held in New Delhi and Mumbai.

The Delhi leg witnessed CIOs discussing how they were enhancing the experience of their customers as well as employees through digital transformation.

Pawan Chawla, Head-IT, CarDekho, provided insights into how his company had created an in-house VR app that provided customers with virtual guided tours of commercial vehicles, test drives, and access to a lifelike experience as that in a showroom.

“We have used native software like XCode and Android Studios, which are powered by gaming software like Unity and other apps available in the market. Based on these applications we have built this VR experience for customers,” he said.

“Customers that call the contact center likely started their journey on the web or their mobile phones. Picking up the phone and calling a company to place an order to resolve a customer service issue is rarely the first choice of consumers anymore. Do your contact center policies and procedures recognize that fact? Do you equip agents with knowledge of other customer interactions that may have happened 2 minutes ago or 3 days ago or last month?” he argued.

Shetty threw light on how Avaya was leading the market in providing enhanced experience for customers and users.

“Our vision is to be a leading player in the user-defined experience in the digital world. We intend to drive a smart, digital world where engagement across devices and software is always secure, always in context, and always user defined,” Shetty said.

“We enhance customer experience (by providing them the option of any channel, any time, journey driven, personalized, proactive, informed by context), user experience (by giving them the choice of client and the information), application experience (through easily, rapidly customizable workflows and processes), and offer proactive and pre-emptive engagement through analytics,” he said.

Throwing light on his digital transformation journey, Parameswaran said, “As the economy moves towards a less-cash society, we have moved to what we call as Alliances, Relationships & Technology (ART) approach for digitized banking. This form of collaboration has helped us to provide innovative financial solutions and address any concerns of our corporate, SME and retail customers.”

Velhal said, "We have focused more on automating our workforce through collaboration. We have been a "zero mail" company globally for the last few years with a single aim to improve collaboration. We have our own social network called blueKiwi to facilitate collaboration, idea generation and ease of working.”

The CIOs also provided best practices on how to achieve seamless and fruitful collaboration within their organizations.

“Collaborative organizations must formulate a strategy before rushing to buy the latest collaboration tools. The technology should support the strategy. One size doesn't fit all. It is important for IT leaders to lead the pack in enabling a host of viable choices and provide some guidance on which tools can be best leveraged for the particular use case at hand,” Kukreja said.

“We need to re-look at our internally processes and systems to ensure that they are in sync with the business. Only then can we have collaboration in the true sense and deliver a great customer experience. We must understand that true collaboration is not the same as either teamwork or cooperation, but is an organization-wide cultural value that should be embedded in the company’s fabric.” Madhan added.